NEW YORK — Sunbury Press has released The Making of a Don, Charles Ursitti’s fictionalized account of the rise of a Mafia boss in New York’s Little Italy decades ago.

Paul Sorvino

What Others Are Saying:
This book is most rare in its chronicling of a mafia family. Ursitti tells the story without sentimentality or literary agenda. As easily as ordering a plate of pasta with sausages. His style seeks no approval for itself but in short order the minimalism, nay innocence, compels and invades so that you feel you are in the very rooms where the hits are agreed to and business is set aright and lurking death is assuaged once more. Atavistic, primitive and oh so hard to put down! — PAUL SORVINO (actor: Good Fellas, Nixon, Law & Order, Murder She Wrote, Moonlighting …)

About the Book:
Frankie Boy reminisces about his childhood living in a big, Italian, Mafia family in New York City and how excited everyone would get each time Uncle Frank, also his mentor and idol, came by his grandma’s house for a delicious, Italian meal. Uncle Frank is Frankie Boy’s entire world growing up, and he continues to be so throughout his life. However, Frankie Boy wants to pave his own path in life, a life of legitimacy, and a life where his hard-earned degree is being put to good use. With the help and support of Uncle Frank, he is able to do so. However, life doesn’t always unravel exactly as we’d like it to, especially when your uncle is Capo dei Capi, Boss of Bosses, and Frankie Boy finds himself once again searching for his place and purpose in life. Uncle Frank once again offers him the opportunity to learn the family business, and after much deliberating, Frankie Boy begins learning the ins and outs of mob life with his best friend Nicky at his side, a loyal and loving friend that goes to extreme lengths to ensure the success of Frankie.

The Making of a Don is a raw and very real portrayal of the inner workings and hierarchy of the Italian Mafia. Frankie Boy works his way up from the very bottom with the experienced guidance of his uncle, and he learns that even those that are closest, those that are “family,” can still betray you in the worst ways possible. Frankie must decide who he can really trust, who has his back, and what lengths to take to protect his business, his family, and his friendships. Nothing is at it seems when you’re in the mob, and Frankie must find ways to ensure all five families are happy and under his thumb.

About the Author:
Charles J. Ursitti grew up in New York City and has spent most of his life there.

After working in the corporate world for ten years, Charles turned his talents into producing and promoting billiards. His events were aired on ABC’s Wide World of Sports with Howard Cosell for five years, CBS Sports Spectacular with John Madden for seven years, NBC’s Sport World, ESPN, USA Cable and numerous other local cable stations. He managed and promoted the legends of the game including Willie Mosconi, Minnesota Fats, and Steve Mizerak, just to name a few. He also created

the most accurate and complete history of both pocket billiards and three cushion billiards from their inception in 1878 to present times. He is known as one of the most knowledgeable billiard historians in the world. His efforts were rewarded when on October 29, 2015 Charlie became the 66th inductee in the prestigious Billiard Congress of America’s Hall of Fame.

Charlie was also a firearms designer and a professional skeet, trap and handgun shooter. After a severe car accident in April of 2000, he retired from shooting and turned his skills to writing. He wrote for several billiard magazines and then turned to writing novels.

TICONDEROGA, N.Y. — Sunbury Press has released Perilous Journey: The Two Faces of Benedict Arnold, the late Ted Brusaw’s historical novel about the Revolutionary War accomplishments of the controversial general.

Few Americans are as controversial as Benedict Arnold, whose name is synonymous with treachery and treason. Arnold was one of the heroes of Fort Ticonderoga, who later became frustrated with the pace of the Revolutionary War and the politics. At a time when all of the patriots were under threat of death for raising arms against the British crown, he caved to the pressure and flipped sides. Ted Brusaw recounts these events with historical accuracy, adding depth and detail only achieved in a novel.

EXCERPT:Still wearing the uniform of a Massachusetts militia colonel, Benedict Arnold returned the salute of the sentry outside General Washington’s headquarters and entered the building. Pausing to allow his eyes to adjust to the relative darkness, he was surprised to see that General Washington’s headquarters looked remarkably like all the mercantile establishments he had seen during his many years as a merchant. It was crammed with writing desks and tables heaped with documents. Papers were even stacked on the floor, leaving hardly enough space to walk, and officers sat at the desks scratching away with quill pens. In the fireplace, a small blaze kept a kettle of tea hot.

Arnold recognized General Horatio Gates, General Washington’s adjutant general, from descriptions he had heard around army headquarters and campfires. Gates was a squat man of fifty who peered through thick spectacles out of a beefy, red face. Slightly stooped with straggly hair, he looked more like a fussbudget of a schoolmaster than a general. In spite of his appearance, however, he had a reputation in the army for being bluff and hearty with soldiers.

“General Gates, I am Colonel Benedict Arnold, just returned from Fort Ticonderoga,” he introduced himself, aware that Gates would recognize his name. “I have a proposal I would like to submit to General Washington.”

He casually looked Arnold over, took the proposal, and sat down to scan it. Then he rose. “Wait here, Colonel,” he said. “I will take your proposal to General Washington.”

Gates returned twenty minutes later and escorted Arnold to the inner sanctum of the commander-in-chief of the Continental Army. General Washington stood to greet him. Washington was in his early forties, a man of commanding presence who stood 6′ 2″ and weighed perhaps 190 pounds. His reddish-brown hair was tied in a queue at the back of his head, and wide-set blue eyes looked out from a face that had been scarred by smallpox. Defective teeth showed when he smiled.

“Good day, Colonel,” he said, looking down slightly at the 5′ 8″ Arnold. He motioned to a chair. “Please have a seat and tell me about yourself. Are you married? Do you have children?” Arnold’s proposal to march to Quebec through Maine’s stark wilderness intrigued Washington, and he wanted to size up the man before determining how seriously to take it. Arnold took the offered seat and looked up at the still-standing Washington.

“I was recently widowed, general, and I have three young sons back in Connecticut with my sister.”

Washington seated himself opposite Arnold. “Please accept my sympathy for the loss of your wife. So you are from Connecticut, but you wear the uniform of the Massachusetts militia?” Washington’s brows rose slightly to turn the statement into a question.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Charles “Ted” Brusaw (1931-2015) graduated from Clarksburg High School (Clarksburg, IN) and served in the Air Force for four years. Ted graduated from Miami University (Oxford, OH) and retired from NCR (Dayton, OH) in 1986. He was the co-author on many text books and had three novels published.

NEW YORK – Nov. 28, 2015 – PRLog — Sunbury Press has released Murder in Tuxedo Park, William E. Lemanski’s first novel, set in late Victorian New York state.

The wealthy, gated community of Tuxedo Park, in upstate New York, has been home to many of America’s financial titans and social luminaries for over one hundred years. However, during the later nineteenth century, this staid, secluded enclave became the stalking-ground for one of America’s most heinous, early serial killers. The murder and mayhem continued unabated until an eccentric and brilliant young scientist and his alluring new acquaintance began their pursuit.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
William E. Lemanski, a Viet Nam combat veteran, has a former engineering background in the nuclear power industry. Since retiring from both the New York Power Authority and Entergy Nuclear Northeast, he has been a freelance journalist in the Hudson Valley of New York, has held public office as a councilman and served as a police commissioner in the Town of Tuxedo, New York. When not researching new book material, he spends time traveling the world on various big-game hunting expeditions.

EXCERPT:
The long, narrow, serpentine road curved beneath the overhanging trees in dappled shadows as it wound through the quiet forest. Barely noticeable in the shadows, a large, stately mansion, will occasionally emerge, setback a distance from the road and shielded by a stone wall or iron gate or a barrier of yew. Some with sprawling gardens, others with boathouses fronting the lake and still others with courtyards and horse stables.

The imposing structures were the abodes of the rich and influential titans of Wall Street and the sporting class of the early 20th Century. The gated enclave of Tuxedo Park, nestled in the Ramapo Hills, a mere thirty miles north of Manhattan, was one of the first planned communities in the country as well as one of the most affluent. And why not, after all, the new elegant dinner jacket worn by the upper class and heads of state is named after Tuxedo. This new look in fashion occurred when the New York gossip columnists would swoon over the Hamptons in the summer along with the Autumn Ball and winter sports of Tuxedo Park as the seasons revolved. The Park was even the national epicenter of that ancient, arcane and elitist sport called court tennis, not to mention the home of some of the nation’s finest thoroughbred racehorses.

Author William Lemanski relaxes in his Tuxedo Park residence.

Originally created as a forested playground by tobacco magnate, Pierre Lorillard, the uniqueness of the Park became just as eccentric as some of its inhabitants. Aside from its thousands of acres of stonewalled seclusion, it boasted miles of electric street lighting and its own electric generating plant while over ninety-nine percent of the country still burned gas lamps. Just outside its imposing stone entry on the Post Road, a small community, actually a company town was established to house the hundreds of European laborers imported by Lorillard to build his many miles of roads and stone fencing and who also served as the maids, butlers and general staff of the Park’s inhabitants.

One of which, I became.

***

Perhaps one of its most eccentric and brilliant property owners was James I. Montague-Smith, who was referred to as Monti. His middle name was bestowed in honor of the famous British engineer, Isambard Kingdom Brunel, the brilliant and equally eccentric 19th Century character who built the Great Western Railway and the first propeller-driven transatlantic steamship. Monti’s father was a British expatriate who, besides working with Brunel in the early years, became a colleague of Nicola Tesla, Edison and many other of the shining stars of 19th Century electrical science. Although also an engineer, Monti’s father focused more on the economic growth of the technology and became fabulously wealthy accruing a fortune from his many business interests.

Monti, although holding degrees in medicine and engineering, lived as a country squire and relied on his vast inheritance while spending his time dabbling in various experiments in his Tuxedo Park laboratory. Curiosity was his driving force having never found a diversion that wouldn’t interest him. His twelve-hour days were spent sequestered in his lab pursuing arcane investigations into obscure and sometimes bizarre topics. Science fiction was not his forte, but rather he questioned “by what force would a pencil drop to the floor?” And why would mass exert attraction to other mass, and just what defined the nature of one’s spirit, and so on into many of the inexplicable and esoteric phenomena of nature’s mysteries.

SUNBURY, Pa. — Sunbury Press has released John L. Moore’s Warriors, Wampum, and Wolves, the eighth of eight volumes in the Frontier Pennsylvania series.

About the Book:
In April 1753, frontier missionary David Zeisberger prepared for a month-long voyage up the Susquehanna River’s North Branch by walking along the river bank at present-day Sunbury and selecting a suitable tree to fashion into a dugout canoe.

Zeisberger and another missionary felled the tree, then spent two days hollowing its trunk into the shape of a canoe, before setting sail. A month later they came upon a fleet of 25 canoes carrying Nanticoke Indians upriver. “As far as the eye could reach, you could see one canoe behind the other along the Susquehanna,” the missionaries wrote.

Zeisberger is one of many real characters who people the pages of this non-fiction book about the Pennsylvania frontier. Others include Shikellamy, the Iroquois half-king at Shamokin; Conrad Weiser, the Pennsylvania colony’s Indian agent; Teedyuscung, king of the Delawares; Benjamin Franklin, builder of frontier forts; and a Delaware war chief known as Shingas the Terrible.

Author John L. Moore used journals, letters, official reports and other first-person accounts to portray the frontiersmen and the events and conflicts in which they were involved.

The stories are set mainly in the valleys of the Delaware, Juniata, Lehigh, Ohio and Susquehanna rivers.

What Others Say:
“Moore brings us an engaging treatment of Gen. Edward Braddock’s ill-fated campaign in 1755 to oust the French from the Ohio Valley. His account gives us a fresh perspective of something often lost in the histories of this march through the wilderness – the troubles the British army experienced with logistics and their erstwhile Native American allies.

“Moore includes a later description by Moravian missionary John Heckewelder of how horses’ hooves made ‘dismal music’ as they walked over the unburied bones of Braddock’s soldiers. But Moore’s book is overall about a lost world of encounters in the forest between the colonial Americans and the Iroquois and Delaware – the tree paintings along trails and the travails of a Seneca given the English name of Captain Newcastle. It’s a world worth visiting.” ~ Robert B. Swift, author of “The Mid-Appalachian Frontier: A Guide to Historic Sites of the French and Indian War.”

“One can’t go wrong with this work. It’s the kind of tale one might read aloud to one’s children out in the woods at evenings while huddled around a campfire.” ~ Thomas J. Brucia, Houston, Texas, bibliophile, outdoorsman and book reviewer

“As someone who despised history classes in high school and practically fell asleep during college history courses, I must admit that I immensely enjoyed this fascinating read.” ~ Catherine Felegi, Cranford, N.J., writer, editor, and blogger at: cafelegi.wordpress.com

David Zeisberger

Excerpt:
Friday, July 3: “We spent a very noisy night. The confusion and noise never ceased, and the drinking was kept up all night long. There were about 200 drunken people in the town.” The residents of the town were using their canoes to ship rum from Oswego on Lake Ontario.

Zeisberger and Cammerhoff decided that they would get as much rest as they could and depart for Onondaga as early as possible in the morning. “I remained in our hut very tired,” the bishop wrote. “In the evening, when I left our prison for a short time, I could scarcely walk as I had eaten very little for several days. During the afternoon, my faithful David tried to make some tea for me.” To obtain water, Zeisberger walked to a spring half a mile away with an empty kettle. “On his way back with the kettle of water, several of the drunken savages caught him and drew him into a house, took his kettle, (and) drank the water.”

With a determined effort, Brother David managed to regain possession of the kettle and returned to the spring to refill it. “But some drunken savages pursued him again,” Cammerhoff said. “He … ran too quickly for them and gained the hut, but by a long circuit through long grass. David then boiled the water with much trouble and fear, and we refreshed ourselves with some tea, the only nourishment I had taken in two days.”

“Towards evening, David went out once more, and on his return a troop of drunken women came rushing toward him. Some were naked, and others nearly so. In order to drive them away, he was obliged to use his fists and deal out blows to the right and left. He climbed up a ladder, but when he had scarcely reached the top, they seized it and tore it from under his feet, but he regained our retreat in safety.”

This same day the brother of an important chief came to visit the Moravians. The man “was still sober,” the bishop reported. “We … told him of our intention to start early tomorrow morning and gave him a piece of tobacco and several pipe stems to present to the chiefs when they were sober. We asked him to tell them that we deeply regretted having come such a long distance without being able to talk to them.”

About the Author:
John L. Moore, a veteran newspaperman, said he employed a journalist’s eye for detail and ear for quotes in order to write about long-dead people in a lively way. He said his books are based on 18th and 19th century letters, journals, memoirs and transcripts of official proceedings such as interrogations, depositions and treaties.

The author is also a professional storyteller who specializes in dramatic episodes from Pennsylvania’s colonial history. Dressed in 18th century clothing, he does storytelling in the persona of “Susquehanna Jack,” a frontier ruffian. Moore is available weekdays, weekends and evenings for audiences and organizations of all types and sizes.

Moore’s 45-year career in journalism included stints as a reporter for The Wall Street Journal; as a Harrisburg-based legislative correspondent for Ottaway News Service; as managing editor of The Sentinel at Lewistown; as editorial page editor and managing editor at The Daily Item in Sunbury; and as editor of the Eastern Pennsylvania Business Journal in Bethlehem.

NEW YORK — Sunbury Press has released J. R. Hipsky’s A Guide to Finer Dining. The author is a former waiter in New York City.

About the Book:
High-end Dining from the Pro Server’s Perspective
Working in the restaurant industry for almost two decades gave J R Hipsky more than enough material to produce a practical and honest, yet humorous guide created to improve the higher end of the industry for both consumers and employees alike. His passion to excel in ballroom dancing, with plans for opening his own studio in the future, led him to move to NYC and spend six years acquiring some of the best training the country had to offer. While in training, he used his many years of experience as a server to acquire positions in fine dining locations, taking advantage of the industry’s flexible scheduling and high earning potential. He soon became equally as passionate towards trying to improve the high end restaurant industry, for he believed most of the problems that occur between consumers and employees stem simply from a lack of communication and misunderstandings. During his last two years as a professional server he created A Guide to Finer Dining, his attempt at bringing everyone to the same page so to speak. J,R. has recently retired completely from his career as a waiter, and now enjoys a successful career as a ballroom dance instructor.

A Guide to Finer Dining is a brutally honest, yet hilarious look into the high end restaurant industry. After spending nearly two decades of his life in a restaurant of some sort, J.R. Hipsky has pretty much seen it all. He used his real experiences and knowhow of the industry to create a book that attempts to improve the industry by bringing consumers and employees together towards a better mutual understanding, and also to provide a source for better communication. Though his book was designed primarily as a guide to help ensure consumers enjoy fantastic dining experiences, he also provides useful information and insight for those interested in a career in fine dining. Included is a behind-the-scenes look into the business of wine, a reference of restaurant jargon, a section on Restaurant Week, a taste of health inspections, and much more.

Excerpt:
(From the chapter on Wine) … When we are ready to open your selection, there are specific ways suggested for us to cut the foil, keep the label facing the guest, placing the cork here or there, etc. You shouldn’t really do anything with the cork, unless you like to collect them. Look at it and put it down if its handed to you. I pull the cork and immediately pour a taste so that you can begin examining your wine while I twist the cork back off my wine key. I only hand it to you if you ask for it. You are to smell the wine, not the cork. I have heard so many dumb things said by guests about the corks pertaining to the wine. If the cork breaks, it’s usually because we are trying to open it too quickly and it snaps. We can still get it out, and this doesn’t mean anything is wrong with the wine necessarily.

Please, simply swirl, smell, and taste, then let me know to pour or not. I need to get moving. I’m really not concerned with what you smell in the beginning, or what you think of the tannins, or how it will be better when it opens up. Have that conversation with your guests. There is no reason for you to keep me around while you act as if you are at a blind tasting, trying to determine what you are drinking and from where it was grown. All the information you need is on the bottle for you.

I had a good friend ask me if it would be poor etiquette to ask his server to simply open and pour away, because he finds it a bit awkward to swirl and taste and such and really doesn’t care anyway. The answer is please do, because we don’t really care either. I can’t tell you how many times I have been the victim of some douche bag’s cold, hard stare as he swishes a taste through his mouth, only to give me a tough-guy nod when he approves.

How I hold a towel or hold the bottle really doesn’t matter. What does matter is that ladies are first, and the host or whomever ordered it is last, male or female. I have heard that it is proper to start with the oldest among the females of a party, but I have found anything dealing with women and age can lead to serious trouble, so I avoid this. After serving the ladies we then move counter clockwise around the table to the men. I suggest that everyone avoid forcing unnecessary comments about the wine due again to peer pressure and just enjoy it. Also we servers are not too often concerned with what fabulous wines you have at home in your cellar, in case you felt like filling us in.

About the Book:
Susan always knew her family was different. Whether it stemmed from an unusual and often complicated childhood, or from her experiences with the “other side,” Susan lived on the outskirts of a normal life. As a young mother, she naively navigated the dating world, while stretching the boundaries of her ability to find her calling. Through trial and error, she found love in all the wrong places until, one day, she discovered where true love originated from.

You’d think that being a child of a conservative family living in New York, with a Yugoslavian immigrant mother and World War II veteran father would make Susan’s life interesting enough. However, add a dash of coffee cup readings, a tablespoon of past life memories, and stir in a grown intuitive woman who survived the dating world, and you have a cup of New Age angst.

Born on a full moon, under the Chinese year of the Fire Dragon,Born Fire Dragon follows Susan on the marvelous ride of life.

I’m in a dream of sorts and here is the Tony award-winning actor from The Bird Cage, and Carrie’s good friend from Sex in the Citywho was gay, but decided to marry a straight woman. Nathan Lane, dressed up in a white suit that shimmers in the light surrounding him, is what my brain has decided God looks like. He stands there patiently waiting for me, flashing that bright Broadway smile. Where are we? Standing on clouds that don’t really look all together like puffs of condensed air and water? Instead, I realize we are in the place between heaven and earth—the place where sometimes, during deep meditations, I meet those from the other side. It’s like a popular coffee house where there is no limit to slices of zen and good company. He’s waiting for me.

Nathan Lane (aka God) asks, “So, do you want to stay or do you want to go?”

I knew this moment was coming for about a year now. I could feel it in my bones. I had hoped to be awake for this moment, to make a conscious choice, but here I was, my soul standing before him while my body was nestled under an abundance of covers and pushed up against my husband Charlie.

“I need time to think,” I said. Stupid. Stupid. This is what happens when you allow your soul to do the talking. Time. Time for what?

I used to be painfully afraid of death. Even though I had these experiences that all added up to me knowing there was more aside from this so-called-life on Earth, I had no need to go. Been there, done that, many times I was sure. However, in the past year I started to make peace with the concept of death. I allowed it to creep up on me like a good story, wiggle its way into my mind and settle comfortably there. Now I was deciding whether I was fine with death, right here in this moment. Was I ready to go?

I read somewhere once, perhaps in a Sylvia Brown book, that we have a certain number of “outs” in our lives. “Outs” are choices as to whether we wanted to stay or go. I guess here was another “out” option for me. I didn’t want to take this option. I want to grow old well into my nineties and squeeze the nectar out of life. Left up to my soul now, would I make the same decision my mind would make?

I know death well. I’ve seen its face three times in my personal life and many times with others. Death and I, we’re old buddies.

About the Author:
Susan Kiskis is a yoga instructor, energy worker, and intuitive guide. While Susan’s path started as a child in New York City, her quest for the answers to life’s biggest questions took a turn when she was twenty. She studied Buddhism, Hinduism, and other religions before starting on a path to learning the healing arts and yoga. She has been certified in over fifteen areas of holistic healing and has taught at conferences, classes, and workshops on the East Coast. Susan’s community activism has led to the creation of events celebrating Earth Day and International Women’s Day. A freelance writer and former politician, Susan owns a yoga studio in Mechanicsburg, PA, where she lives with her husband, daughter and lots of pups and kitties.

Kiskis is available for interviews and appearances. For booking presentations, media appearances, interviews, and/or book signings, contact hello@barefootwellnessstudio.com.

NEW YORK — Sunbury Press has released Matthew Taub’s first novel Death of the Dying City about the gentirification of New York City in the 1990s.

About the Book:DEATH OF THE DYING CITY is a panorama of New York City’s rapid gentrification and shifting cultural enclaves in the 1990s. Rotating character-driven vignettes are connected by Mark Newstein, a young ethically-imperiled attorney facing additional issues of romantic upheaval.

Excerpt:
It was a rather mundane, almost formulaic way to bring a crushing end to a career, Mark Newstein thought as he waited for his ethics committee hearing to begin. Yet despite this cynical, disengaged assessment, Mark remained paralyzed by fear. He could feel his heart pounding in his chest, every seemingly innocuous sight and sound—of workers gossiping while coming back from their coffee break, or the receptionist’s banter with a postal worker delivering a package—putting him further on edge. Mark was excitably unhinged, but also extremely fatigued—he hadn’t slept properly in several days. He tried to focus on anticipating the questions he would soon face. The committee would surely be asking him about his conduct and the questionable conduct of other members of his workplace over the past few years. It wasn’t every day that a law office boasting multi-million dollar profits, closely affiliated with another highly-visible firm advertising a catchy “1-800” number on every subway car, television channel, billboard, and radio station throughout the metropolitan area suddenly ceased to exist. The committee would want to know why.

Until they called him, the front reception area of Departmental Disciplinary Committee (“DDC”) was where Mark was forced to wait. This Downtown office was a fitting, funereal accompaniment for his demise: lights dimmed too low, blotched stains peppering a shabby carpet, lumpy couches, faded magazines, and a neglected potted plant wilting in the corner. The building itself was of faded stonework, sturdy but otherwise unremarkable. Manhattan’s own Ten Downing Street, this nondescript appearance belied the office’s enormous stature and power. When lawyers are first licensed to practice law, they are approved by a separate committee on Character & Fitness; the DDC was its own distinct entity that, depending on the circumstances, could later find that character to be sorely lacking. The committee had the power to reprimand, censure, sanction, suspend, and even disbar lawyers deemed unfit to continue practicing law. Mark Newstein was their next case to review.

Mark presented himself that morning in proper business attire, but otherwise was completely disheveled—unshaven cheeks brimming with prickly stubble, his auburn hair a shaggy mess, posture edgy, movements discombobulated. Hand gestures twitched with nervousness. The static silence of the waiting room provided little solace. He couldn’t bear to read any of the stale literature while he waited; instead, Mark simply began to reflect on his seemingly short-lived career. A young man at the end of his twenties, he had only practiced for a short period before it all came tumbling down. Shrewd and savvy enough to do well in his industry, he still knew well the ethical boundaries he never wanted to cross, regardless of whether there were repercussions. It was therefore with particular irony, and utter disbelief, that he marveled at the circumstances in which he found himself. The truth was that his fervent commitment to honesty and integrity, rather than saving him from this place, had only ushered him here more quickly.

Asforhisprivatelife,his“relationship”withStephanie, if that was even a proper title, seemed to be approaching its inevitable, crushing finality.Howlonghad itbeensince she stopped returninghiscalls?A partofhim alwaysknewthey weredoomed, but it was torture to think of her reluctant engagement to the man of her mother’s insistence. It all seemed so laughably antiquated for their modern times, yet too real to chuckle away. He thought of the mother, that bossy cow, and her obscene desire for that smiling moron. Mark kicked himself for being so poor a judge of character.

And then there was the city itself, permanently deranged. In the mere half decade Mark worked as a lawyer, the Big Apple was dragged, kicking and screaming, from its former destitute dereliction to present-day, gleaming modernity. While briefly achieving a pleasant homeostasis—that sought-after nexus between ghastly grit and sanitized sedation—it didn’t last. As ever more sprawling middle class and creative havens were reimagined as high-end locales, the new world priced itself out, made unaffordable as quickly as it became accessible, wiped clean of any character and instead morphed into a tourist’s playground, a cartoonish and corporate viewing spectacle. The ephemeral places and faces Mark knew were dying out, knocked over as they were like dominoes. As the dynamic metropolis he knew and loved came to an end, it seemed Mark would follow right along in it.

About the Author:
Matthew A. Taub is a lawyer, fiction writer, and occasional journalist living in Brooklyn, NY. His work has appeared in Absinthe Revival, The Weekenders, Red Ochre LiT’s BLACK&WHITE Magazine, The Squawk Back, Schlock Magazine, Foliate Oak Literary Magazine, The Fat City Review, Raw Fiction, The Brooklyn Daily Eagle,Greenpointers and Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn.Est. 250 pages

DEATH OF THE DYING CITY is his first novel. Though a work of fiction, the work grew out of the author’s fascination with the traumatic history of New York City’s emergence from the doldrums, and his witnessing truly vexing issues involving the ugly underbelly to the legal profession and wanting more— more from the justice system, and more from the individuals who make a living within it.

Inspiration for the literary style and themes of the novel came many prior works, including Richard Price’s ”Lush Life,” Tom Wolfe’s ”Bonfire of the Vanities,” and Jonathan Lethem’s ”The Fortress of Solitude.”